Slack vs. Teams vs. Google Chat

Arun Jyothi
4 min readJan 11, 2024

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With the rise of remote work and distributed teams, the demand for robust collaboration tools has grown significantly. Slack, Microsoft Teams, and Google Chat are three significant players in this field. Each platform offers unique features, and understanding these differences is essential for organizations looking for the most suitable tool to enhance their team collaboration and productivity.

Choosing the right collaboration platform depends on various factors, including the organization’s size, features, and budget constraints.

In this article, we will delve into a detailed comparison of Slack vs. Teams vs. Google Chat platforms to help businesses make informed decisions based on their specific needs.

  1. Pricing

Slack offers a free plan with basic features limitations and limitations on message history, while its paid plans unlock advanced features and increased storage. Microsoft Teams is included as part of Microsoft 365 subscriptions, offering a cost-effective solution for organizations already invested in the Microsoft ecosystem.

Google Chat is part of Google Workspace plan, which follows a subscription-based pricing model. The pricing for each collaboration tool varies depending on the plan you choose, offering different features.

2. User Interface and Experience

The user interface and experience vary significantly among Slack, Teams, and Google Chat. Slack is known for its user-friendly interface and clean design for easy navigation, making it quick for users to adapt and use effectively.

Teams offer a well-organized interface, leveraging design like other Microsoft 365 applications. The platform allows you to organize multiple channels under a single Team, contributing to a structured and efficient collaboration platform.

Google Chat presents a straightforward and uncluttered interface consistent with other Google Workspace applications, providing a seamless experience for users familiar with the Google ecosystem.

Each platform’s unique design contributes to the overall user experience, impacting how users communicate, collaborate, and navigate within their chosen collaboration tool.

3. Integration with Productivity Suites

While Slack supports a wide range of third-party integrations, it does not have the same level of integration with productivity suites as Microsoft Teams and Google Chat.

Microsoft Teams and Google Chat integrate seamlessly with the Microsoft 365 suite and Google Workspace, allowing users to collaborate on real-time documents within the chat platform.

4. Audio and Video Conferencing

In terms of audio and video conferencing capabilities, Slack’s free plan offers unlimited one-to-one voice and video chats, and upgrading to a subscription plan enables group meetings with up to 50 participants.

On the other hand, Google Workspace’s basic plan allows meetings of up to 100 people and can be upgraded to 1000 participants, making it a suitable choice for larger enterprises.

Microsoft Teams, included in Microsoft 365 plans, supports online meetings and video calls for up to 300 people with Business Basic, Business Standard, Business Premium, and Apps for Business plans. For enterprise-level subscriptions such as Microsoft 365 E3, E5, A3, A5, and Government G3 and G5 plans, the participant limit increases to 1000 people, offering a scalable solution for diverse business needs.

5. Search Functionality

Using Slack, you can easily find messages, channels, users, and files and filter information by date and users. Also, it allows you to exclude specific channels from your search.

On the other hand, Google Chat offers advanced search options to filter your search results and get the results faster. Using Google Chat, you can filter by date, from, said in, has link, has file, and mentions me.

Microsoft Teams allows you to search and find information by filtering based on type, teams and channels, date, from, @mentions, has attachments, hide apps and bots, making it easier to find what you are looking for.

Final Verdict

Ultimately, the choice between Slack, Microsoft Teams, and Google Chat depends on the unique needs and preferences of an organization.

If your business is using Slack and has subscriptions of either Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace, considering a full consolidation through strategic migrations from Slack to Microsoft Teams or Slack to Google Chat helps to save costs.

CloudFuze facilitates the transition from Slack to Teams and Google Chat, preserving the customers’ Slack workspace’s direct messages and channel content. Contact the migration experts at CloudFuze for tailored assistance in making your migration process successful.

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